Sermons

'No One Ever Told Us'

Eleanor Roosevelt was one of the great statespersons and humanitarians of the past century. She helped more than one generation to recognize its role in the development of the newly emerging world. Her words still reach out to guide us in the face of a threat she never knew.

Mrs. Roosevelt wrote, "I gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which I must stop and look fear in the face…I say to myself, I’ve lived through this and can take the next thing that comes along...we must do the things we think we cannot do."

I have been taking my cues from you these past few weeks. I’ve been listening to your comments and your responses to the terrorist bombings. I’ve been listening to your feelings. And I’ve tried to pull them together for these sermons in a way that honors what we are going through here, twelve miles west of Ground Zero, in a way that helps us to ask ourselves the important questions and that helps to keep our eyes and hearts and minds tuned to the vision that our religious impulses suggest.

The feelings I’ve heard you talking about this week include ongoing sadness and grief. They include anger and determination. They include a profound tiredness and deepening depression. Some of you have told me that you feel stuck. You feel for a while like you’re moving along, getting on with life, and then — snap — something happens and you feel just as you did on September 11^th when you were engulfed in a stunned sense of helplessness. You don’t have to feel alone in your misgivings. We are all on the road to recovery.

Still, there is a new feeling that has come into prominence this week that I want to focus on this morning, the feeling of fear. There are two particular fears that I’ve heard about that I’d like to address with you. The first has to do with who we are, here in this congregation–who we are and who we are not. The second is fear of what act of terrorism might happen next.

My guess is this first fear transcends the extent of this congregation and that it is a growing concern across the country. The concern is, given the broad spectrum of how we all feel about the attacks and what we each think ought to happen as a result, how can we stay in relationship with one another and hold on to the underlying values that uphold us all.

This week I’ve heard from a number of church members who, because they don’t support a pacifist response to the attacks, feel they don’t belong here as much as they once did. Nothing could be further from the truth, at least the truth as I see it and as it is preached from this pulpit.

Last week I said that I’ve observed a rapidly growing polarization in our country... Arrogant claims of the moral high ground and demands for capitulation from any other viewpoint do not provide the balm we need for healing. It is not un-American to want vengeance. It is not un-American to want peace. It is an American value though, one supported by the principles of this faith community, to promote an articulation of the many differing views so that we can take the time we need to develop a common view.

This week I want to say it even more clearly and strongly. This is not a political arena. This is a religious home where we come together in pursuit of our collective and individual spiritual quests. We each need to take personal responsibility for what we think is right and we have to allow others to find their right. Only arrogance encourages us to think that our own right must be someone else’s.

Our principles guide us to accept one another and to encourage each other in spiritual growth. They guide us to affirm and promote a free and responsible search for truth and meaning. There is no room here to be intolerant of another’s heartfelt convictions. There is all the room in the world, all the need in the world, to have a place where we can come together in respect, to accept differences and to transcend those differences with bonds of love.

You are no more or less a Unitarian Universalist, no more or less a worthy citizen of this nation, no more or less a deserving child of God (or the Universe) because of any political conviction. And you are certainly no more or less welcome here. All are welcome here who are seekers after truth. All are welcome here who are willing to question their assumptions.

We need to hear from one another. We need to see the many sides, the many facets of these issues if we have any hope of affecting a future that is brighter than our present. This is new ground. This is scary stuff.

This first fear is one that certainly has my concern. I have great confidence in our congregation though, and I have growing confidence in our nation that we can indeed remain in relationship with one another, remain in conversation with one another. We are going to need to do that. We are going to need one another and all the support we can get to face the second fear that I’ve been hearing from you.

Eleanor Roosevelt said: "I gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which I must stop and look fear in the face…I say to myself, I’ve lived through this and can take the next thing that comes along…"

The thought first occurred to me last Sunday evening. It hit me like a ton of bricks and then like a thunder bolt that sat me upright in my chair. Through the course of the week, I’ve heard the same thought, the same fear expressed by so many of you. I’ve read it in the news, I’ve heard it on the radio.

As the reality of our being the victims of terrorism sinks in, as the prospect of future attacks demands our attention, the question is no longer "if" but "when." There is likely to be at least another horrific event. We can run from this fear, but we can’t hide. We can deny it but we can not make it go away.

Amid stories of crop dusters and spray trucks, amid reports of countless independent terrorists cells we are left with the prospect, far more likely than not, that — if not even more — there will very likely be at least one dying effort by the terrorists to strike again. We have no idea of its likely form, its location or its magnitude, only that it will be driven once again by unbridled determination and unmitigated disdain for American lives and the American way of life.

We do not know if we or our loved ones will be safe. We do not know who will personally be at risk, only that we are all collectively at risk…that we will all collectively lose something dear again.

You may think me an alarmist or a doomsayer. I pray that you are right. But this isn’t just my fear; I’ve heard it from you, too. So, even if we are all wrong, even if none of this comes to pass, how do we live with this fear? How in the world do we carry such a burden? How do we continue to function? How do we face our children?

The answer must be that, even in the face of our losses, even in the face of potential future losses, we must learn to live with fear. I think a secondary fear is that we will be crippled by the first. But we cannot.

We will need to take courage. We will need to build strength. And we will have to act confidently until we can grow ourselves into that confidence.

All the moments of our lives have prepared us for what is next. And, even if the events of the next moment are utterly deplorable, it will still be our task to find in them the opportunity to promote life.

Our lives are a collection of events; these are the facts. Our lives take on meaning by what we make of the facts, and that–that is our life’s story.

Victor Frankl indicates that our primary motivation in life is to make meaning of the events. Frankl’s own story is one we would do well to hold up in our moment of fear, and to trust that we, like Frankl, are capable of finding meaning and responding positively to life however deplorable the prospects.

In his book, Man’s Search for Meaning, probably the most important book I’ve ever read, Frankl tells of his experiences in the Nazi Holocaust. He was imprisoned in Auschwitz and in other camps. He was beaten and forced to undergo unbearable degradations. His wife and all his family were murdered. Everything that we consider to be essential in our lives that could be taken away from Frankl was stripped from him.

His was the story of Job. And like Job, that which could not be seized from him, was his humanity. And privately, he found ways to experience and celebrate that humanity. He found art and humor. He found that which held him in connection to life and he found love.

Whatever we might endure in the weeks and months to come, let us commit ourselves to our humanity, let us avail ourselves of art and humor, and let us give ourselves to love. Underneath everything else, love, is that most precious gift that gives meaning to our lives. And love grows only when it is given away. So in this time of fear, may we find it in our hearts — now more than ever — to give love, and to grow love. And by love may we find our way through our fears to even more meaningful living.

Victor Frankl’s experience and words give me great hope in the face of fear. There is another more recent story that also gives me hope. It’s a story from the World Trade Center that we are all familiar with. Beneath the gruesome cover of this story is another verification of the primacy within our lives to uphold life by giving it meaning — even in the face of annihilation.

Thank God the footage has been removed from television broadcasts, but we all saw far too many times the images of the planes crashing into the towers. What we couldn’t see, but what we’ve learned is that inside the buildings, immediately following the strikes and before the collapses — these buildings were filled with great and phenomenal acts of humanity. Heroism was everywhere.

And even more to the point is the number of telephone calls being made by those who realized that they were about to die. They phoned home to talk to their loved ones or to leave them messages on answering machines. And those messages had a very common theme. It was, "I want you to know that I love you." In the final minutes and seconds before death, those people reached out to life…with messages of love. Would that, if we could, we would do no less.

We don’t know what’s coming but we do know what we are capable of — we are capable of loving. And if we are not sure of that, then we need to remind ourselves and each other.

A few years ago, I was called to the hospital bedside of a man who was nearing death. He was in a panic. Had he been wrong in his assumptions about life, he wondered? And now in the face of death, would his life add up to nothing?

So I asked him to tell me about his life, about what he cherished, about what he had accomplished, about what his life had meant to him, and what it had meant to those around him. It was his own answers that brought him comfort. Actually, to my astonishment and I’m sure to his own, his answers brought him more than comfort; they brought him jubilation.

"I gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which I must stop and look fear in the face… We must do the things we think we cannot do."

We need to remind ourselves and each other of what we’ve been through and what we are capable of. We need to remind ourselves and each other of our truest values. We need to sustain our spirits and to help one another be sustained in these dark and fearful hours, so that the meanings we make and the choices we take will be toward life and — however it may be diminished — toward living life fully. However difficult things may become, we need not forget what matters; we need not forget that which has served our lives and the larger Spirit of Life of which we are a part.

Howard Thurman says, it more poetically,

"There is a quiet courage that comes from an inward spring of confidence in the meaning and significance of life. Such courage is an underground river, flowing far beneath the shifting events of one’s experience, keeping alive a thousand little springs of action."

No one could have ever told us that we would be facing these realities of this day. But since we are, we are called to prepare our very best response in the face of the very worst situations. We can do that. Let us live with no regrets.

In these times to come, may that quiet river of courage flow through our hearts, our thoughts, our actions and our preparations. May we be good stewards of the gift of life as we share it caringly here and now in our congregation, and as we pass it on to the world that follows.